Senseless
by ThornsOfaPerfectRose
Summary: The fight with Falco goes wrong, and a chain of events is the result. The turtles are kidnapped and April must save them, but that's only the beginning. A complex TMNT fic I wrote for a friend. Kind of long, and I update at least weekly. DonnieXApril LeoXIrma LeoXKarai RaphXKarai RaphXOC (later). Rating might go up later, depending on how bloody it gets.
1. In the End

In the end, there will be loss. In the end, there will be sorrow. In the end, everything will be gone and there will be nothing to remember anyone or anything that ever swam, walked, laughed, loved, lived, or died on this insignificant little planet.

But we can sure as hell hope that the end won't come, because, let's face it, it probably won't during any of our lifetimes, or our children's lifetimes, or their children's. So we try and live our lives and put aside the fact that whatever we do, whoever we are, we will not be remembered forever.

And then there are those who brighten others' lives without knowing it; day by day, bringing light and happiness to those around them. The hopefuls, who don't care whether they're remembered, or liked at all, who are just trying to be happy and keep even strangers happy too, if only for a short while.

One of these is April O'Neil, an Irish-Polish with a kidnapped scientist for a dad, and a turtle for a best friend.


	2. Intense

"By the way, do you really think you have a chance with April?" he sneered.

Didn't he know she was standing just outside?

"She couldn't ever like _you."_

Couldn't he read her thoughts?

Donnie kicked out at the evil scientist, but even April could tell what he was thinking. The mutant flipped at the last moment; where a foot-to-the-temple should've knocked Falco out, a side step and grab sent the attacker to the ground instead.

So why couldn't Falco sense her despair?

Donnie grimaced, trying to hide the pain in his already-hurt left arm. Falco wasn't having that; April looked away as her turtles lights went out. He was the last to join the brothers on the ground.

A surge of anger left the redhead's fists clenched and her eyes narrowed, but she knew she couldn't hope to take a psychic on alone- she needed Splinter.

MWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMW MWMWMWMWMWM

"I cannot help you."

She nearly punched him then and there. "_Whynot_?"

"April," Splinter said as she took a deep breath. "I am needed here. I have no doubt Leo will get them out safely, but if I were to leave, Shredder's agents would discover our hideout and our struggles would become that much more intense."

She sighed loudly, knowing he was right in some fields, but so, so wrong in others. If the turtles couldn't take Falco out directly, a team of the injured and exhausted certainly couldn't. But he _was _needed there.

"Just rest, April," he continued. "I'm sure everything will be fine."

Just rest, he'd said, as if she were a little kid. Just rest, like he was her crap dad who thought he could order her around.

So how about no?

April wasn't going to take that; she'd save the brothers herself if she had to.

She promptly facepalmed herself, muttering, "Hello, April." She _could _save the brothers herself. Correction: she _would _save them herself; she had to.

What she didn't know was who would save her.


	3. The Kraang Facility

**So, this story might take a while to be completed, but did anyone notice my Young Justice reference in the last chapter? If you find it, leave it in the comments and I'll check out your stories! Yay!**

Her heart pounded to the beat of a James Bondish drama song; she had to have been spotted. Yet no sirens wailed, no bullets whizzed past her.

Kraang. Why had he teamed up with the Kraang?

The worst part was the technology. She was pretty sure it was messing with her head. It was more than likely- they _did _have a psychic now. And as she walked down a hallway towards a metal door that couldn't have been more than ten feet away, she knew her assumption was right. Twenty minutes later, the door was somehow farther away.

April sunk to the floor, clutching her head and trying to fend off the attacks on her psychi. She had no such luck. It felt as though she'd been the victim of a skull stabbing, but she wasn't pitied, forced instead to endure it without the blessed hand of death taking her away.

It could have been hours, it could have been a horrible dream, but finally she screamed, "GET OUT OF MY HEAD!" And somehow, she felt the intense pain receding, the scientist had heeded her words and vacated her mind.

A breath of relief left her mouth as she shakily stood up and continued to make her way to where she thought her friends were stored. The door was unlocked, and there was Mikey, surrounded by his brothers as they tried to stop the bleeding.

April gasped internally; externally she rushed forward, ripping off the sleeve of her t-shirt and holding it across Mikey's injured midsection. Leo took over, applying pressure after nodding at the girl with a look of gratitude. Meanwhile, Raph glanced out the door with a we've-got-company grimace. Thinking, April closed her eyes and immediately felt a tight hug. She knew who it was before she opened her eyes in surprise.

Her purple ninja, safe.

Her genius turtle, so close she could feel his heartbeat.

Donatello, whispering, "I'm so glad you're safe," as he gripped her tighter.

**I realize some of you might not know what a psychi is, so here you go: it's basically you're mind, just a fancier word. And if you read this, please comment or even PM me with what you think so far; I really want to know and I am open to suggestions.**


	4. Realizations

April grabbed the tassels of his purple mask and yanked, effectively forcing him back. "I hope you realize that if you ever get beat up like that again... I'll... oh, come here." And she wrapped her arms around his neck, burying her face in his shoulder, letting her tears run down his plastron.

"Hate to break up the love fest, but there _are _like thirty Kraang dopes headed this way," Raph shattered the moment with the message, and Donnie's eyes went white as his turtley extra eyelid slid down in anger. "Plus the psychic dude who managed to beat _me. ME!_"

"He's right, guys," Leo cut in. "There'll be time for sappy stories later, but first we need to make later a reality."

"This is what I live for." Raphael grinned as he leapt into the onslaught and somehow took down five guards with no weapons whatsoever before hitting the ground. Of course, the red ninja is a resourceful one, and within seconds he'd acquired a gun for each hand, plus one to toss to Mikey as the color returned to his face.

The other four made their way out, April supporting Mikey; in exchange he kept the droids away with some handy lasers. She led the way, and within minutes he could stand. Almost immediately, though, all four turtles fell to the ground, leaving April surrounded by downed enemies... and downed friends as well.

She took a deep breath, although surely _he _could tell she was panicked inside. Falco. If it wasn't bad enough they had Shredder after the mutants and the Kraang after the sole free O'Neil, there was now a mind-reader out to get them too. None of it was fair.

But, then, April hadn't grown up on fair. She grown up losing her two grandparents at age four on the nine/eleven Twin Tower flight, back when she lived in California (they'd moved to New York shortly after, almost like the city itself were a memorial to Ira and Jerzy). Her own mother had died of tuberculosis when April was twelve, leaving her nobody on that side, as _her _parents had long been lost when Mrs. Ailish O'Neil immigrated from Ireland as a girl.

And then there was _Mr. _O'Neil.

It seemed to an outsider that Kirby cared about his daughters more than anything, but from the inside, it was obvious that work took priority. April's sister, Mairenn, whose name even _meant _rebellious, had hightailed it out of there as soon as she turned eighteen. Granted, that was less than a year before April met her turtles, but she had nobody except a few (let's face it) strangers when her dad was kidnapped.

All of this she realized in a few seconds as she took in the sight of the fallen heroes- how life wasn't fair, but she'd shaken it off before, and she knew she could pull through again.

So she closed her eyes, and challenged Falco to a duel.


	5. A Duel

A duel. It seemed a bit old-timely, even to April, who suggested it. But she wasn't thinking of a sword-and-horse type of fight; no, what she had in mind was a little more... _mental._

She'd been suspecting something since her turtles were dragged away after that first wretched attempt to cut down a megalomaniac at the lab. Something she was scared to think, but at the same time, if it were true, she shouldn't be.

He couldn't knock her out as easily as the others.

He couldn't stay in her head when she wanted him out.

Falco couldn't even _read her mind._

Was she crazy, or was she just as psychic as him?

'Poor little April,' Falco thought at her. 'Such a child inside still.'

'Poor little scientist,' she shot back. 'An ego that large has to be unhealthy.'

He... _glared_, somehow, in her mind, she could feel it. And April knew she wanted nothing more than to kill his psychi.

'You are weak, girl. You've suffered losses, and each one has knocked you farther down.'

'You're wrong,' she laughed at him. 'So utterly and completely wrong. My losses built me up, made me who I am. Made me the girl you're terrified of.'

His surprise, confusion, and self-doubt was evident in a recession of telepathy on the edges of her brainwaves. 'Oh,' she all but spat. 'Didn't you realize it, when I didn't? I can read your mind, Falco. Those are some dark thoughts.'

With her "words" staggering him, she shoved her friends' consciousnesses back into them; the follow-up was yanking Falco's out and leaving him, the brain of a mad genius, inside a decapitated drone's head.

"We're done here," she told the ninjas as they got to their feet. She tossed the head at Donnie. "This needs to be put in a cage, something really secure."

April looked at it, knowing she had done that- how powerful was she? Could she be trusted with that gift? Could she deal with that curse?

She knew it was merciful, she hadn't killed him, hadn't even hurt his mind much; he'd be just as smart, just as crazy, and at least as evil if he ever managed to get out. Hopefully that was unlikely.

He'd make a nice trophy.

But she knew they weren't finished yet, as his eyes began to flicker out of the others' notice, with nowhere for the wires to connect.


	6. Spill

"Is everything okay?" The leader in blue was the first to voice his concern, throwing the question back from the driver's seat; after him, all except Donnie asked multiple times, and her response was always the same- a violent nod before she leaned back onto her bent knees and stared at the ant making its way across the Shellraiser floor.

The silent one just looked at her, the entire long ride home, looked at her as if he was studying one of his more confusing experiments and trying to deduce what was really going on. He never questioned her; he seemed to realize she didn't want to talk and respected that- in fact, when Mikey asked what was up _for a third time, _Donatello's head whipped back to look at him as he said quietly, "Shut _up, _Mike."

From then until they got to the Lair, nobody spoke except Leo asking Don to open the tunnel door so they could get in, although her boys shared a fair amount of worried glances that they didn't think she caught.

When everybody had gotten out, Donnie grabbed April's hand and drgaged her to his lab, giving his brothers a stay-out-or-else look that got the message across- they would not be disturbed- before closing the door with a slight creak.

April sighed in relief. "Thanks. I really didn't want to talk to them."

"I got that," he responded as he turned on his laptop and typed something in that she couldn't see, as the monitor was angled away from her line of view. He hit a few buttons swiftly before turning back around to look at her, leaning against his too-cluttered desk.

"Spill."

"W-w-wha d'ya mean?" April stuttered. For a moment she thought he had caught on to her apparently psychic abilities. She worried that if she was anything like Falco, he would want nothing to do with her.

"Okay, so maybe Leo and the others'll keep quiet about it- only because they bugged you so much initially- but come on, what happened back there?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," April said stubbornly.

Donnie looked at the stain-covered floor, and then glanced back up into her eyes. She met his gaze evenly.

...which was a mistake on her part, as his rusty eyes held desperation, and disappointment, and a deep, deep, _hope _that she would tell him the truth. She took a deep breath to steady herself against his piercing plea.

"Why don't you trust me?" he whispered, holding onto her forearms so she couldn't turn away.

"I-I _do _trust you, Donnie, but..." at this she glanced at the door, which he took to mean it was his brothers that were the problem.

"But you think if I know they'll find out and you don't want everyone to know." It wasn't a question, it was a statement, and she confirmed it with a relieved nod. "Well, do you have a best friend?"

Her eyebrows rose and her eyes narrowed in confusion. "You're my-"

"I meant aside from me. Like, on the surface."

April laughed lightly. "Oh, that would be Irma."

"So tell Irma." Donnie grinned cheekily. "We don't even know what she looks like. The mystery girl- seems ideal for a secret-keeper."

She half glared at him; the other half couldn't help but point out to that irrational side that it wasn't a bad idea. "That's just it, I _can't._ She doesn't know about you guys either, and frankly, I don't want her to tell the guidance counselor at school that I'm insane if I try to explain that my dad was kidnapped by dimensional aliens and the only reason I wasn't is because some amazing genius TURTLE mutant thing saved me and he's like the greatest guy ever so now I'm friends with him and his brothers..."

"Shhhh, calm down, calm down."

"You know what, Donnie? Fine! I am a psychic and I'm just like Falco and that's probably why the Kraang want me in the first place! Happy?!"

"Yeah, I am," he told her, and she brightened. "I'm going to do some research on it and _you _should go to your room and relax and realize that that is possibly the best freaking thing you could've said."

She wiped her eyes and nodded, heading out of the lab to the room she'd been assigned when she started staying there for most of her time.

Just before she walked out, Donnie added one last thing: "Thanks for bringing the Shellraiser when you came for us. Smart move."

April smiled slightly and was gone in the blink of an eye.

It was only after she had left that he allowed himself to think about what she'd said when she was rambling on and didn't seem to realize what she was saying.

Turtle mutant thing.

_Amazing genius _turtle mutant thing.

_The greatest guy ever._

It was only after she had left that he allowed himself to grin like there was no tomorrow.

**Sorry this was so late, but I've had a bit of writer's block recently and when I originally wrote this chapter, my computer turned off and deleted it, so... Yeah.**

**Anyway, this one's longer than my normal because I kind of merged it with another one, but it's still short in general.**

**And I have news: since I've been lacking motivation for this story, I'm not going to continue until I get 10 positive reviews on this chapter. Sorry, but if people don't comment, I don't want to write.**

**I'll have another chapter up by next week if I get the reviews.**

**Bye.**


	7. Discovery

April had the room next to Mikey's, which wasn't exactly fun at 3 a.m. when the ninja decided to play EXTREMELY loud video games. Not that she complained; from walking around when everyone was asleep, she'd decided the only one who wasn't annoying at night was Leo.

Raph would either talk to Spike or play the games with Mikey (the latter usually resulted in a certain younger brother getting beat up). Donnie was up most of the time mumbling about some new sciencey thing she didn't even pretend to understand- that in itself wasn't bad, it was more the random beeps and typing that drove her insane. Leo seemed to be, as always, the responsible one who listened to Splinter and got some sleep "so he could be just as successful in combat as Captain Ryan in Episode 23 of Space Heroes"... April'd figured out not to ask when he went into dork mode.

So on yet another restless night, while she sat swinging her legs to the beat of her heart and lazily wishing she were taller because the tips of her toes still couldn't touch the floor from the ledge she perched on, the eldest brother appeared without a sound. It was a comfortable silence, sitting there next to each other in the almost pitch blackness of the Lair, until he spoke.

"I think," he began, seeming unsure how to word it. "I think I'm over Karai. Like, for real."

The redhead grinned. "Smart move, L. She wasn't exactly right for you."

Turning serious, she continued. "Don't worry, Leo. There's a girl who's perfect for you out there. You've just got to look."

A few moments later, Leonardo turned the conversation. "So how about you? Got a boyfriend up on the surface?"

She blushed profoundly. "Not really, no. Not even more than one actual friend."

"Good..." he muttered.

"What?!" April exclaimed, inching away.

"Oh god, not me! Ugh, I shouldn't've said anything."

She thought for a moment. "Then... Who?"

There was a slightly awkward silence before he said, "I, uh, I really shouldn't say..."

She nudged him with her elbow, grinning. "C'mon, please?"

"Well, uh..."

She froze in realization. "It's Donnie, isn't it?"

He nodded and stepped back. "I, uh, I'm just going to... Go now. So, yeah." And he slunk back to his bedroom, leaving no evidence that he'd ever left.

-—-

There'd been clues, of course.

The way he blushed and stuttered when she was around, how he went out of his way to help her, the time he'd "joked around" with Metalhead's speakers. But she hadn't allowed herself to believe it until now.

-—-

Donnie was staring at Leo, soaking in what he'd just said. "What do you mean, she knows?"

"She just kind of... Figured it out." He said sheepishly.

"And you confirmed it?!" Donatello was fuming, and his brother could almost see the steam coming out of his ears.

"Well, um, yeah." Leo answered. "But it's not like you were gonna tell her. I did you a favor."

"How the hell is that a favor?! I would've told her on my terms, thanks, and now everything's going to be all awkward and, ugh, I'll just pretend nothing happened and maybe she'll forget."

"Sure. She'll forget. And while she's at it, she'll grow a shell and call the mutagen mom." At this he rolled his eyes. "Face it, Don, that's the kind of thing that sticks it your head, and its not like you were discreet about it or anything, it was pretty obvious to everyone."

Donnie leaned his forehead on his palm, closing his eyes and thinking deeply. He shook it off. "No, okay, if I pretend I don't know she knows then maybe she'll think you don't know what she thought you knew and she'll question what she knows."

He had blurted it all out quite fast, and Leo nodded, telling him, "I have no idea what you just said, but okay."

"Just don't mention it t- hey, April! What can I do you for?" The girl had walked into the lab without a sound.

"Hey, um, Donnie, can we talk?" She looked at Leo pointedly.

"Alone?"


End file.
